5/8/05 Andrew helped me prepare five electrical boxes by removing knockouts and installing two conduit adapters in each box.

5/10-12/05 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

It was raining when I arrived at 12:50. After moving in and having lunch, I tried but couldn't light the water heater pilot. I gave up on having hot water for the rest of the day. Then I took the new phone I had brought with me up to the cabin to test it. I found that it was a lot weaker than the 900 Mhz one I had before. I could get a signal up in front of the building but not inside the building or up at the privy. I was disappointed again.

Larry, Roberta, Marsha, and Teranne stopped by to check out the work progress. Marsha had never seen the cabin and Teranne hadn't been there since she was a little kid trick-or-treating at Holloween. I took some pictures of them and they gave me permission to post them on my web site.

After they left, I sanded the logs that were due for the final coat of varnish. It was just the bottom three in the northwest utility room wall and all the stubs to the left of the back door. Then I installed one receptacle box just below and to the right of the kitchen window by chiseling a notch in each of two logs. The conduit runs in the space between the two logs and will be covered by the chinking. I think that plan will work well.

On Wednesday, it wasn't raining but it was nice and cool and overcast. Perfect weather for working on the roof.

Before I went to work, I set the new phone base station on a box right in front of a window in the trailer. When I went up to the cabin, I found that I had a phone signal in the building and also in the privy. I decided that the phone would work out okay after all.

I went up on the roof and I was delighted to find that the rain had washed all the pollen off so it gave me super good traction with tennis shoes. This was exactly what CP had told me except that I didn't have to bother with a hose. I still always had a double connection to a safety rope, but I could at least walk upright instead of doing the batman walk so it was a lot easier on my muscles.

I took CP's special tool up and in ten minutes I had the standing rib straightened up. I found that it was not only bent over flat for about two feet, but it was also bent over about 5 degrees from vertical the entire twenty feet to the bottom. I straightened that part up in one pass. I went back down with the tool and I was really happy it had been so easy to fix the rib.

Next I hauled up the lower 10-foot section of the rake metal and screwed it into the fascia board. It was a little awkward and scary putting in the screw at the very bottom because I had to tie myself to the safety rope with my head downhill and reach over the edge of the roof, but once I convinced myself of the dependability of the safety rope, I did it with no problem. The rest of the screws were a lot easier and I put them in without even using my chicken step rigging. It was still positioned across from the upper rake section and I didn't bother to move it.

Next I went up to the ridge and removed all the screws except the top one from the 4-foot section of rake metal at the top. That would allow me to install the section below it and then re-install the top one so that it overlapped the lower one.

On my trip back down to get the second 10-foot section, I fed a chipmunk who demanded some peanuts. I hauled up the second rake section, installed it, and then screwed down the top section again. I shoved short 1x2s under the rake at each joint to keep it snug against the fascia board. The 1x2s are between the standing rib and the inside of the rake.

Next, I used three clamps and four 1x2s to sort of straighten the ridge where it had been dented. I didn't get it straight at all, but at least I drew it back up into more of a peak. Then I gooped up the two small holes good with the special roof caulk CP had given me.

Then I spent about an hour taking down and coiling up all the ropes and putting away all the tools, ropes, and rigging and taking apart my chicken step rig. When that was done, I chiseled the notches and installed a second receptacle box just to the left of the kitchen window.

I discovered that my method has a problem if the logs are asymmetric, either because of different diameters or because they aren't vertically aligned. In these cases, if I chisel the notches so that the cover plate ends up vertical and just touches the top and bottom log, then the box isn't centered on the space between the logs so the conduit isn't lined up with the center holes. If, instead, I chisel the notches so that the box is centered, then there will be a gap between either the top or the bottom of the cover plate and the log. A third option would be to install the box so the plate isn't plumb, but I think that would look very tacky so I won't even consider it.

The first case happened on the box I just installed; a straight piece of conduit wouldn't fit between the two boxes. After discovering that, I decided it would be better to go for the second case and then just fill in the gap behind the plate with chinking. The second option will also make installation a lot faster.

At the end of the day, I decided I really wanted a shower, so I started the water heater with a propane torch. That worked slick. Then rather than letting the tank heat up completely and having the fire go out again, I decided to start my shower before the water was completely hot. I figured I'd rather have a little cool water at the beginning of my shower than at the end. That way, I could shower as long as I wanted and the water would keep getting warmer all the time. That's what I did and I had a great shower.

On Thursday, it was a beautiful spring day. I started out by whacking bushes on the trail to the privy. The brush is easy to cut down right now because it is new and tender. I have found that if I cut the bushes in the springtime like this, they don't grow back again all summer. I was on a roll so I kept whacking brush and grass past the privy and up toward the drainfield. There I discovered dozens of seedling trees trying to compete with the ferns, bushes, weeds, and vine maples. I whacked all of the trees' competition down to give them a competitive advantage. I am hoping they can evade the root rot and reforest that area again. Most of the seedlings were less than a foot high, but there was one Ponderosa Pine that had a good start and was already about three or four feet high. If the deer don't eat them up, the trees should take off well. At least I hope so.

In the process of bush whacking, two jays and a chipmunk kept coming around for peanuts. It was very pleasant working up there with that company.

Next I bent a piece of conduit in a few places and chiseled away some more of the log in order to get the conduit to fit between the two electrical boxes. It worked, but it was more work than I want to spend on the rest of the outlet boxes.

I scraped the glue off the bathroom window and I mitered and installed the molding on the utility room window. And, finally, I varnished the last coat on the last of the logs on the first floor. I felt good about having that job done and I am very happy with how the walls and windows look. I also won't miss the dust mess at all. I left for home at 1:30.